


What The Heart Asks For ~ Norway x Reader

by ctromedea



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: F/M, This is so sappy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-21
Updated: 2016-10-21
Packaged: 2018-08-23 19:40:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8340178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ctromedea/pseuds/ctromedea
Summary: Being a country is hard and exhausting. Especially when you live for over hundreds of years. The young Viking Trio manage their lives as best as they can in order to make the livings of their people as good as possible. But what happens when an intruder meddles with the ordinary going of things?





	

          Today was such a long day, I thought I’d never get back home from the hunting trip to relax. My attention was absorbed by the dancing flames from the bonfire while I gripped the cloak around me tighter. I was too lost in my thoughts to pay attention to what my brothers were talking to each other. More like Mikkel, the older one, was telling Berwald. For a minute or two I actually wanted to even forget about their existence and focus on my thoughts that have been bothering for quite a while.  
  
          Being the personification of a country was not easy, as some might think.  Besides all the administrative and leading pursuits, taking care of your own people and trying to maintain the existence of your country for another day, I had to live my own life as well, fighting against the barbarians or new territory, hunting for food and surviving. Also, being immortal wasn’t in my favour either. Sometimes I just wished for a simple life, the young men achieved so easily. I want to find someone who I can fall in love with, marry them, form a family and just live our lives like anyone else. But there was no one who could match my life span or my existence experience, no matter how hard I’d wish for it.  
  
          “And then he claimed he could take me down with just one finger! I laughed in his face!” Mikkel, the representation of Denmark, shouted in his obnoxious way, holding his mighty axe above his head.   
  
          Berwald, personification of Sweden, was listening with an emotionless expression, which was kind of his face. Not that mine expressed so much either. The three of us, me representing Norway, were leaders of Viking nationalities, in search of new territories to discover or conquer, new battles to win. Lately, everything has been quiet, our group going on with our lives as usual, hunting for our next meal, preparing the weapons in case of a battle and taking care of the horses. I kind of wished for something to happen.  
  
          “Do you know what I’ve done, Ber? In that moment I just…” Mikkel stopped his story and shushed us as well, like we were the ones talking. “Did you hear that? I think it came from the store house. Grab your weapons, fellows. We have a rat to catch.” The Dane held his axe in attack position and motioned us to follow him.  
  
          From the entrance of the house we had a perfect sight of the storage as well as of the stranger who slowly backing away from it. The man was wearing a red overtunic covered by a dark leather cloak. His head was covered by a sash that only let his eyes be visible. At the waist he had attached the scabbard of what seemed to be a sword.  
  
          “You fool! Did you think that you could trespass without tasting the anger of the gods?” Mikkel shouted, a smirk plastered on his face as the stranger turned to fully face us. “Berwald, show this poor guy some manners!”   
  
          Berwald walked forward at a fast pace, drawing his sword, ready to attack.  But before his sword was even inches close to the intruder’s body, he drew his weapon as well, defending himself from the attack. As Berwald's continuous attacks kept being blocked and dodged by the adversary, who was not far from getting away, Mikkel started running towards the two, a strong grip on his axe. Until the Dane managed to strike the culprit, he disarmed Berwald and dodged his hit just as easy as he escaped the previous attacks, causing him to fall in the snow.  
  
          I was amazed, not by the agility, as we had to fight complicated cases before, but the grace and care he ducked each strike. It was such an awe I almost didn’t react when he started running away from the incident.   
  
          “What are you waiting for, Sigurd? Catch him!” Mikkel yelled at me as he was getting up from the snow.  
  
          Woken up from my wonderings, I knew this was no ordinary work. It was too late to start running after him and even if I outran him, using my weapon against him had the same amount of chances to catch him just as my brothers had. I extended my hand and concentrated on the snow around the stranger. Suddenly, his legs got trapped and he fell face first, giving us an advantage to finally win against him. Berwald was the first to reach him, grabbing him from the snow and holding him close, sword to his neck.  
  
          “That’s right, loser! There’s no way someone can win against the King of Northern Europe!” Mikkel exclaimed. “Now, let’s see the face of the one who dared to intrude our territory.”  
  
          Standing so close to the culprit gave me the chance to take in his appearance. Even though his clothing covering him was the one of a male, his figure seemed to have the other structure, more fragile, not as muscular. Could it be? Mikkel grabbed the scarf covering his face, brutally unwrapping it off and throwing it on the ground.   
  
          The next thing not only shocked the Dane, making him fall on his bottom, but proved that my thoughts were right. As soon as the scarf was thrown away, lovely coloured locks framed a pale and tender face. The culprit’s bright eyes were wide in fear and the lips trembling. No one was able to say anything in the situation, eyes staring and moving around from one to another.  
  
          “You… You’re… You’re a daughter of Eva?” Mikkel’s words broke the silence.

 

~Change of Perspective~

 

          Now I’ve really screwed it up! What am I supposed to do now? Not only that I failed to run away, but I also let my guard down, leaving me uncovered. I was cornered by the three blonde Vikings. Taking by their looks, none of them seemed older than twenty. The tallest one, with piercing and icy aqua eyes, was holding me even tighter than before, the sword so close to my neck that I could barely breathe. The loud one, with wild hair, was still freezing his butt in the snow while recording what just happened. The last one had an emotionless expression, so I couldn’t read him at all. That scared me more than the intimidating and the let loose Vikings. I knew I had to be careful, but now, with his presence around, even more careful.  
  
          “I meant no harm.” I succeeded to say with the edge of the sword close to cutting into my neck.  
  
          “What do you mean you meant no harm?” That loud blondie finally got up from the snow, dusting off the snow from his bottom and grabbing me by my clothing. The weapon was withdrawn from my neck as the strong arms of that guy held me in the air. “You sneaked on our territory and then fought with me and my brother, almost stunning the both of us and you say that you meant no harm?”  
  
          “First of all, it was self-defence. You hit, I dodged.” My hands grabbed his wrists in order to help myself up a little.  “And second, I didn’t intrude on purpose. I was running away.” The other men’s looks were darted on me, waiting for further explanation. “I don’t even know where I am anymore.”  
  
          “You don’t say…” He slowly put me down on my feet and pointed to my weapon. “Hand me your sword.”  
  
          There was nothing else I could do than comply, so I undid the belt with the scabbard and sword and gave it to him quickly, so he won’t see what I just discovered. Only then I observed that I didn’t get away without a scratch, as my hand was bleeding, therefore I covered it with my sleeve as soon as I retracted my hand from his.  
  
          While the energetic man was analysing my weapon, the one with an unreadable expression was fixing me with his look insistently. So did the other guy, but there was something in his eyes I could barely understand, like he was fighting with his own ideas. Suddenly my thoughts were interrupted.  
  
          “I’ve never seen this sign before.” That loud person exclaimed watching the handle of my sword. “It does look interesting.”  
  
          “It’s the coat of arms of our family.” I muttered, moving my glance on my hands. “It keeps reminding me where I belong, so please don’t destroy my only solid memory of my roots.” I fought a lot so far, I couldn’t break down right now. I had to keep going on.   
  
          “Well, I don’t know what to think, kiddo. We did catch you trespassing on our grounds, so we’ll have to take you in for further questioning.” He motioned to the main structure, which appeared to be the house they lived in, in order to head forward, but he kept the sword on my back, so I wouldn’t escape again. “It’s not that we wouldn’t trust you… But we really don’t right now.”  
  
          Once inside the house, he led me to one of the wooden chairs in front of the bonfire. I sat as he suggested and then he did the same, moving the sword away and placing next to the chair.  
  
          “My name is Mikkel. The other two brothers are Sigurd and Berwald.” You looked at the Vikings and blinked, taking in the information. “What is your name, daughter of Eva, and what is your purpose on our lands?”  
  
          “I am [F/L]. I come from the village of Sigmundarnes.” A sigh escaped my lips at the memory of the night that started it all. Mikkel was frowning visibly, like he knew what I was about to say. News travel fast, so he most probably was aware of what happened four months ago. “It was the beginning of October. My father was out to set some deals with a friend on some new weapons. Our family was known for having fighters blood, so my dad was having different business in the town with other people. He also was a blacksmith, crafting for our family and others. Most of my knowledge in sword fighting was gathered from him.  
  
          That night I, my mother and my younger siblings were at home. I was preparing the dinner with some venison I caught that day when I heard the people screaming and crying. I ran out of the house to see what was the matter, when I saw the houses on fire and people shouting, running and hiding, not very far from our place. Men dressed negligible, riding horses, were strolling through our village, entering homes, stealing, killing our men and kidnapping the women and kids. The barbarians were attacking. My instincts told me to grab a sword and protect my younger siblings. If I attacked whoever entered our house first, I would distract them enough to maybe forget about checking the rest of our home.  
  
          My plan failed. There were about four of them and I couldn’t face them all. I was outnumbered. Unfortunately I had to face the same fate as other young people in my village. They tied me and threw me in one of their carriages, along with two kids who ‘didn’t fit in another carriage as they were all full’. We were surrounded by bags and boxes with weapons and goods stolen from other houses. And they kept bringing in more and more. Before we took off, this man got in with us to keep an eye on us so we don’t fool around with their treasures.  
  
          I was so scared and on the verge of crying. I lost everything I had, my house, my town, but the worst of all, my family. Thankfully, I spotted in one of the boxes the handle with a blazon of our family. The guard has passed out for some time and that was my chance to escape. Fiddling through the stolen goods, I procured myself everything I might need from then on, as well as my dad’s sword and did something I can say I don’t regret at all. I cut his throat with a fast movement so he won’t be able to scream for help and, with all the courage and power I still had, I jumped from the carriage, barely making it safely.” I felt my eyes betraying me, as I fought my tears back. Berwald left the spot he was standing a while ago, listening to my story, and made his way to the other fire in the house, working with the pot placed on it.   
  
          “Since then, I’ve been running away, sometimes running into these terrible people and having to put them down… All I want is to get home and check on my family. I need to know if they are alright, if they are safe. I need to know what’s left from our village.” I couldn’t fight anymore. Tears began filling my eyes and falling on my cheeks.   
  
          Mikkel got up angrily from his seat and went to Berwald, his chair taken by Sigurd.  
  
          “You’ve gone a long way.” With a cloth he gently wiped the tears from my cheeks, then he handed it to me. His eyes were of a vibrant blue and his voice was really soothing. “But there is an even longer way to run.” He moved a lock of hair behind my ear. “Right now you are in the village of Eyrarfel. It would take you three months to get back to Sigmundarnes by foot and two months by horse.” Berwald approached the two of us and handed me a steaming bowl.  
  
          “Eat.” was the only thing he said to me, in a very low voice. His gaze seemed to have softened since earlier, even showing some concern and worries.   
  
          “We could help you reach your old home.” Mikkel flopped on the chair on the other side of me.  
  
          “But we want something in exchange.” Sigurd’s thumb caressed my cheek, wiping a lonely tear that was left. “It would be a shame to leave your fighting abilities to rot, as you are warrior material.” He grabbed my sword which was leaning on the chair and held it in front of his face analysing it. “We have been trying to solve the problem with the barbarians for quite a while now. They don’t belong here, even more they have no right to destroy what we already have. We want to either make them recede, or eradicate them in case they keep fighting back. And we want you to join us.”  
  
          I locked eyes with him, his tone putting some sort of spell on me. The same young man I was fearing earlier was drawing me towards him more and more, making me wonder what was under that mysterious mask that kept away his feelings. And getting rid of the people that burned down my home town was a grudge I’ve been having for as long as I’ve known these people. I reached out my hand.  
  
          “I fully accept. As long as I manage to get back home.”

 

~Change of perspective~

 

          It has been over three months since the young lady has joined our team. For me, this was both a blessing and a curse. Mikkel seemed to have liked her since the very beginning. And she was blending in just fine. She was as goot at hunting as she was at fighting, and now we had even more to put on the table at the end of the day. I felt myself getting wrapped into an unknown spell, more and more each day. My heart was beating faster when I was around her and I just wanted to be in her presence. My dream of having someone to love from months ago reappeared and I knew whom I wanted to have in my life, as impossible as it looked like. If only I knew she felt the same for me.             
  
          Biologically, we were all just some kids. Mikkel was the oldest, he was already twenty, also with the oldest existing country among the three of us. Then came Berwald, who appeared to be nineteen and then me, with the age of eighteen. [Y/n] appeared to be the youngest, also being a human, only sixteen. And I hated that at that age, she has already gone through enough. We were countries, we were supposed to go through war and fights, but that tender kid had to be protected at all costs. I wouldn’t forgive myself if anything happened to her.  
  
          “I think we did a pretty great work lately, cleaning the dirty people from our lands.” She cheered, sitting in one of the wooden chairs in the main room.  
  
          “Well, for our next mission, you gotta pack a little. My men told me about a group of barbarians thinking of striking Skapta, a town between our village and yours. From what I understood it would take them like three weeks to get there, so if we mobilize fast, we can outrun them and take them by surprise.”  
  
          Her eyes lit like matches at the mention of her home.   
  
          “Does this mean that after we’re done with this fight, I can finally go home and see my family?”  
  
          “Sure thing!”   
  
          Suddenly she threw herself from the chair in Mikkel’s arms, muttering thankful words to him. My heart sunk when I saw her hugging that stupid Dane. I grunted in order to draw their attention and make her loosen the grip.  
  
          “In that case we have to get going. Fast.”  
  
          After that I left to prepare the horses. We were supposed to meet with the other men from our troops at the entrance of Skapta, so the sooner we left, the sooner we arrived at our destination. I was too deep in my thoughts, and jealousy I won’t admit, to hear the girl’s steps as she came after me. I wasn’t going to give up on my dream that easy.  
  
          “Do you need any help?” The voice rang in my ears, making me drop the saddle I was carrying. “Oh, I didn’t mean to startle you. I am sorry.” Her hands brushed against mine when we both bent down to grab the saddle, making me stand straight and drop the object once again.  
  
          She chuckled, taking the saddle and putting it on my horse. Without further questioning, I let her help me prepare the horses for our journey. We didn’t exchange too many words. She simply smiled towards me from time to time. As soon as we were ready to go, we hoped that our house would be fine and left for our business. From the information we had, there wasn’t a very large group of enemies trying to attack the town we were heading too. With all the luck, we would be finished sooner than we expected.  
  
~*~  
  
          And there we were, in the middle of a battle we assumed we were going to win easily and return home victorious. There we were, with many of our men defeated, their bodies lying around and waiting to be brought back to their families so they could mourn their deaths. There we were, catching our breath in a forest not far from the town before we had to strike again the enemies that were closer to our fortress.   
  
          It was an ambush, we didn’t have enough time to strengthen our forces and we fell into their trap. There were many more barbarians than we assumed, coming from all directions, attacking furiously in revenge for their fallen comrades. I took a look at my team to make sure they were alight. [Y/n] and other three males were patching up the wounded, Berwald was checking up on the ones that were still able to fight and Mikkel was sharpening some of the weapons we had on us. Other troops were on the other side of the town, fighting to take down the enemies on that part, while we had to mobilize ourselves to strike again.   
  
          “I think you should do what you did when you caught me on your territory.” I was so lost in my plans, I didn’t observe the young lady coming next to me. “There is no way they could fight that.” She was dressed the same way as in the first day we’ve met, men’s clothes, a thick leather cloak on her shoulders and her face and head hidden behind a white scarf.  
  
          “The more we fight, the more I think you’re right. If we continue losing our men like this, I won’t have any other choice.”  
  
          “I think you should decide faster. We must save the poor people in Skapta and get rid of these trashes infesting our lands!” She was serious, but who wasn’t in a time like this, and she was right.   
  
          Our men have been powerfully fighting and resisting the ambuscade, cleaning off many of the enemies, even if that costed their own lives. But between all these courageous hearts, the head team, consisting of me, my brothers and [y/n], have been resisting the most, killing time after time and protecting others as much as they could. Even though we were outnumbered in the beginning, fate seemed to start shining on us.   
  
          “Okay, fellows. We have no more time to waste. Grab your swords and let’s slaughter thee who dare to spoil our soils.” Mikkel shouted accompanied by the fight yells from our men.  
  
          And so the fight began again, hell broke loose once more as swords were hitting one another and dying screams roamed across the forest. But this time we were ahead the others, as with my magic many of the enemies were unable to strike or defend themselves. I wasn’t on the battlefield, in the middle of the war, so I could have a good sight on all the warriors and have a favourable aim in casting the spells upon them. The thought of victory and revenge was getting me hyped, totally making me forget about the surroundings or a possible surprise attack. And for sure I didn’t hear [y/n] screaming and running at me. I processed what was going on too late. And I was too late to stop the sword, that was meant to stab me, to pierce through her abdomen.  
  
          My eyes went wide and I couldn’t control my rage anymore, causing the bastard who impaled my love to freeze to death, then and there.   
  
          “No, no, no, no. It’s going to be alright. Everything will be alright.” My young love was penetrated by the edge of the sword as her blood was gushing out of the fresh wound.   
  
          “Hey… The others… They need you.” Her eyes were read and her voice hoarse. She grabbed my hands while I was trying to get the weapon out and work on the wound. “You are their hope to win this fight…”  
  
          “I am not going to let you die! I can’t lose you! Not now! Not ever!” Tears were filling my eyes, but I had to control myself if I wanted to see what I was doing with my hands.  
  
          “Revenge me. And the ones who died for our lands.” She smiled weakly before closing her eyes, her grip on my wrists loosening before her hands let them go, falling on her chest. “I… love you. Please… Take care…”  
  
          I suppressed a hurt yell to escape my throat as I did everything I could to enwrap the wound and stop the bleeding. Before I finished my work, her body already went limp, losing the heat. Rage filled my entire body, taking my consciousness and free will away.  After I dragged her further from the battle field, I couldn’t stop my anger anymore, smiting and igniting all the bastards that were on the battlefield. I must admit, it was one of the worst and bloodiest fights we’ve ever had so far. My actions were so terrible, that at the end, while claiming our victory and freedom on our lands, our men were indeed terrified of the warrior I’ve unleashed.  
  
          When I got back in my senses, I started rewinding everything that happened, processing the events and the words I’ve exchanged with [y/n] before releasing myself in the battle. My eyes went wide and I felt like a million arrows stabbing me in the heard. I’ve just realized that she confessed her love to me. And I never had the chance to do it.

 

~Change of Perspective~

 

          My whole body was in terrible pain. My head, my back, my abdomen, everything was hurting and I could barely move. When I opened my eyes, it took me a while to adjust them to the light in the room, blinking a couple of times. I couldn’t remember much of what happened, where I was or how I got here. The last thing I saw before total darkness was that idiot, Sigurd, almost getting himself killed because of his negligence.   
  
          Talking about Sigurd, it appeared that I was back in his and his brothers’ journey tent, laying on one of their beds.   
  
          “Oh, you’re finally awake!” I couldn’t see things very clear. A silhouette was making its way to me and set at the edge of the bed. “I thought I would never see you again.” That voice couldn’t belong to anyone but the emotionless bastard I feared the first time we met. He grabbed my hand into his and placed a kiss on top of it.  
  
          “Sigurd? What happened?” But he seemed to have ignored my question.  
  
          “Don’t you ever do that again! I was so scared I lost you forever! You shouldn’t have jumped in front of the sword. You had to take care of your own skin!” He tightened his grip on my hand, holding it close to his cheek.  
  
          “What?” It took me a while to comprehend everything he said. “You mean you'd rather have died instead of letting me save you?”  
  
          “Yes! Because if you had died, you would have remained dead forever!” He shouted back.  
  
          “Dead forever?”  
  
          His gaze softened after he realized what he said. He let my hand go and then caressed my cheeks gently, moving some locks of hair from my forehead.  
  
          “If you’re gone, you can never come back. But me? There is something you don’t know about me… You’ve taken quite well the fact that I can use magic. But that’s not the only thing weird about me.” He took in a deep breath before continuing. “I am… immortal.”  
  
          On one hand, the news struck me like a lightning bolt. On the other hand, it didn’t last long, because I kind of expected something as crazy as this to happen to a Viking that has magical powers.  
  
          “And I am the human form of the country of Norway.” Okay, well this is crazy… "I know I will find a way to work it out. I promise..."  
  
          I didn’t have time to respond or express my ideas in any way because his lips covered my own in a short, but loving kiss. My lips were burning, but so were my cheeks and probably my whole body, making me wonder if maybe I had a fever.   
  
          “But I fell in love with you. From the first days you’ve spend with us, my love for you growing more and more. It wounded me more than any battle scar to have you hurt on the battle field, almost losing you. I don’t want to live in a world without you. I am willing to search all around the world if I have to, just to find a spell to make you live by my side forever.”  
  
          This was a lot of information to take in for a person that almost died and has been brought back from the battlefield. But only the gods knew that I didn’t want this moment to end.  
  
          “This being said…” Sigurd got up from the bed and kneeled in front of me. “[Y/n], I want you to be my wife! I want to have you by my side and love you till the end of times. I will protect you from any bad and just as well, I’ll stand by you in good or bad. Will you marry me?”  
  
          In that moment, neither the headache nor any other pains seemed to have an effect on me, as my eyes started to water.  I grabbed his hand in mine and gave it a squeeze before accepting with all my heart. 


End file.
